ASSESSMENT OF COMMERCIAL LAMB MEAT QUALITY BY BRITISH AND SPANISH TASTE PANELS

Trained sensory panels in Britain and Spain assessed loin meat from co mmercial lambs purchased in Spain, which included Welsh lamb (imported from Britain) and two Spanish breeds (Merino and Rasa Aragonesa). The British panel also assessed British lamb purchased in local butcher s hops and supermarkets. Sensory panels, in each country, received meat from the same lambs and used their local methods of cooking and assess ment. Spanish panels used unstructured line scales to measure lamb odo ur intensity, tenderness, juiciness, lamb flavour intensity and two he donic scales of flavour liking and overall liking. The British panel u sed 8 point category scales with the same attributes. Results from bot h panels in objective parameters were in agreement, hence showing that different trained sensory panels may arrive al the same conclusion. H owever, when panellists were allowed to make hedonic judgements (prefe rence), the British panel preferred British lamb and the Spanish panel preferred Spanish lamb. This finding has important consequences for l amb producers who export their lambs and demonstrates that the underly ing reasons for different preferences should be investigated. Producti on variables are discussed in relation to their influence on lamb eati ng quality and as a way to tailor lamb eating quality attributes famil iar to consumers in the importing country. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science L td. All rights reserved.